


Dusty Photographs

by bjfic_archivist



Category: Queer as Folk (US)
Genre: Angst, Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-07-02
Updated: 2006-07-02
Packaged: 2018-12-27 10:45:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,131
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12079488
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bjfic_archivist/pseuds/bjfic_archivist
Summary: ...and paperclips.[Justin is leaving Brian. It's taking all of him to do it, but he's going to. And - secretly - in the back of his mind he -- actually, no.. with ALL of him, he wants Brian to ask him to stay this time.]





	Dusty Photographs

**Author's Note:**

> Note from IrishCaelan, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [The Brian/Justin Fanfiction Archive](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Brian_Justin_Fanfiction_Archive). To preserve the archive, I began importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in September 2017. I posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [The Brian/Justin Fanfiction Archive collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/bjfic/profile).

  
Author's notes: I know, another new one. I bet you're all yelling at me to finish the other ones and i'm sorry. I'll get around to it, I will.

This is not the only chapter. Theres another when Brian comes home.  
Will he let Justin leave and will there be more chapters? Or will he ask him to stay this time?  


* * *

I'm leaving him.  
  
I've got a bag of clothes hidden behind a door, and though I won't admit to such cruelty; I want it as a surprise. I want to see him taken back, stunned. His mouth wide open, and his eyes watery. I want to hear that little noise in the back of his throat, the squeak of a hard gasp.   
  
I'm ready to leave it all behind. I'm ready to accept that I'm going alone, and that I just may need to do it all alone. I'm ready to stretch my heart out and step out on a branch, not so sturdy. I'm ready to at least try.

I just wanna see how far I can get before things break. I wanna see if I can get to a place where nothing breaks at all. I wanna get to a place that teaches me to fix it all. I wanna lie in a world so comfortable I couldn't imagine the clouds as a better resting place. 

And yeah, I may never find it, but I wanna travel, and look.

I got too many plans and not enough foward motion. I got too many dreams, and not enough good ones. I got so many things, but all things, I could probably do ~~better~~ without. There has to be something. There's got to be somewhere I belong. Somewhere that my soul reaches on like songs. Somewhere the days don't stop at sunset, and the nights go on past daylight.  
  
Somewhere I can survive without him.   
  
I tried telling myself this is just another dark night, another dark night alone with my words, alone with the night. Second floor loft looking out on chilling landscapes, my fingers freezing from incessant painting, now warming around the nicotine stink of a camel. The ice has run through the windows and there is no heat, my breath escaping in steam to freeze in the air and fly away. So much freer than me.  
  
I can't pinpoint the exact moment, unlike before. I could always remember the exact second, exact minute, precise day. Now nothing will hold. Somewhere along the way I stopped holding on. Which was the first clue. The second was when he'd stumble in at 4am, 2 hours past our agreed time, smelling of tuna casserole and weed. I'd never known him to talk things out, with anyone. So when he started going to Debbies to vent, I knew. He was no longer comfortable telling me things. It was a month or so later that I stumbled upon the last clue; an old photograph of us hidden in a drawer. It was the one he kept on his office table. 

We were both shirtless, laying on the white couch asleep. Lindsay has shot it and it was his favorite. Now it lies in the drawer under mine, where nothing else resides but dust.   
If he can sleep when I feel like this then obviously I care too much. I don't care who's to blame. I care too much. What a shitty feeling. Nights like these it would just be easier to give in. Sometimes I think I would rather be alone than be with someone who can sleep when I'm contemplating bleeding out the sadness.

And for the record: sometimes sex just makes you feel better and I shouldn't be made to feel bad about myself if there are times when it's the only thing that does. It doesn't solve problems, it's just the best distraction I know of. Sometimes I don't want a solution...I just don't want to think about it.  
  
So I'm leaving him. And he won't stop, even though thats what I've been waiting for. For far too long. For his hand to reach around my arm, scream at me 'you fucking dip-shit, you can't do this to me again, to us'. And I'd smile, and put my bag down. Ask him if he wants to stay in and watch a movie and he'll take me straight to bed without an answer.   
  
But I've got to face it, sometimes Cancer, and Explosions, Death and Distance can't change Brian. No matter how hard he thinks otherwise. How many times he pretends he likes painting with me at 3am, and coming home before midnight. Spending time with me, all the time. 

Sometimes I feel like this is nothing more than a paperclip romance, two pieces held together by the common pressure of a small, slight weight, once made out of wire, now made out of plastic. It can be dressed up in fancy colours and different sizes but it will always be a simple paperclip.   
  
Once created out of brass, the paperclip has been reduced into one made out of cheap wire or plastic, as brass was seen to be too costly to mass produce. And like the paperclip, it’s as though our love has been reduced, but not just because of popular demand, but also because of the high price; instead of making me happy, it’s making me sad.   
  
All around me, people are falling in love and falling into each other, and I envision a huge chain of paperclips, linking into an almost-bracelet, stretching on and on into infinity with love. And all I have are memories of what we were, then, and what we aren’t, now. 

It’s a **paperclip love story** , cramped and compressed, and held together by a wire bent in a fancy shape with a loop on one end. This love is flimsy and flexible, able to change shape or break apart with the slightest amount of pressure and a simple twist. Perhaps it is more vulnerable than the hearts it holds together, one on top of the other, like two important paper-thin documents.   
  
It is a simple piece of metal resting above the pages, a small link between two otherwise unrelated hearts. This love is less reliable than a sturdy and strong staple because it can be quickly and easily removed, leaving the hearts in tact, at least theoretically.   
  
The paperclip is slipping; I can feel it. And though, once removed, it’s supposed to leave the paper whole, my heart is anything but complete. The corners of my heart have fallen off along with this paperclip, and all I am is. Completely torn. Tattered, frayed, whichever word suits your preference. In the end, the result is the same:   
  
My heart just won’t stop aching.   



End file.
